Behind The Scenes
by RocknVaughn
Summary: Jack and Devlin meet to discuss Sydney's insistence on reinstating Vaughn as her handler.


Behind the Scenes  
  
Disclaimer: These characters belong solely to JJ Abrams and his wonderful writing staff. Imitation is the best form of flattery, so please be flattered: Don't sue! Thanks!  
  
Spoilers: Through "The Box".  
  
Timeframe: This takes place during episode three ~ "Parity".  
  
Author's Note: I'm considering making this a serial of sorts. Let me know if you'd like to hear more from Jack and Devlin. Thanks! (And thanks to Ashni for bringing to light my brain cramp on Lambert! How could I forget?)  
  
  
  
CIA Headquarters, LA Branch  
  
Seamus Devlin sat impatiently drumming his fingers on the surface of his huge oak desk. 'It shouldn't be long now…' he thought, just as the intercom on his telephone buzzed.  
  
"Mr. Devlin…" his assistant Ms. Markell's voice intoned nasally, "Senior Agent Bristow to see you, Sir."  
  
Devlin checked his watch and nodded with satisfaction. "Right on time as always," he muttered to himself before depressing the 'Talk' button on the intercom and replying, "Yes. I've been expecting him. Send him right in."  
  
A moment later his office door opened and in walked the immaculate form of Jack Bristow. He and Jack went back a long way. They had worked side by side on many occasions as both junior and senior officers, and Devlin knew from experience that Jack Bristow's work for the CIA had always been top rate. And personally, Devlin considered Jack a trusted associate; an equal instead of a subordinate because he knew that if things had gone differently so many years ago, it could very well have been Jack sitting in this chair instead of him.  
  
Pulling himself from his thoughts, Devlin stood, reaching a hand across the desk in greeting. "Jack," he said cordially.  
  
Jack Bristow slid his hand into Devlin's, shaking it succinctly and responding in kind, "Seamus."  
  
Releasing Jack's hand, Devlin sat, offering the chair before him to Jack. "Thank you for coming on such short notice, Jack. You know we wouldn't have called you if it weren't of the utmost importance."  
  
Nodding once, Jack replied, "Yes, I know. What can I do for you?"  
  
Devlin looked down at the closed dossier folder on his desk blotter before meeting Jack's eyes and replying, "It's about Sydney."  
  
Jack raised a questioning eyebrow; the only outward sign he gave of his surprise and concern.  
  
Devlin mentally shook his head with admiration. Jack Bristow had a hell of a poker face…the best in the business. Of course, he'd learned it by necessity…  
  
"Sydney? What's the matter with Sydney?" Jack asked in a neutral tone.  
  
"It seems we have a bit of a situation with regard to the reassignment of her handler."  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"Well, as you will recall, we had originally assigned her with another junior officer."  
  
"Yes, a Mr. Vaughn, I believe," Jack offered.  
  
"Right. At the time, Jack, we weren't aware how deeply entrenched in the vital SD-6 missions she was. And Vaughn is one of our best and brightest. He'll make a damn fine senior officer one day…" Devlin cleared his throat self-consciously as Jack's stare continued to bore into him. "But after the incident in Virginia…well, I thought it would be best if she were working with a senior officer, one with more experience in being a handler."  
  
"Who did you assign?" Jack inquired.  
  
"Lambert. He may be a bit stuck on procedure, but after the fiasco with Virginia, I felt Sydney needed an experienced handler. Lambert has over ten years of handler experience."  
  
"Yes," Jack agreed. "So what is the problem?"  
  
Sighing, Devlin explained, "The problem is that Sydney has refused to work with him."  
  
Jack leaned forward in his chair and his glare intensified, if that were possible. "What do you mean, 'She's refused to work with him…'?"  
  
"At their last meeting, she flatly refused to follow his counter-mission order."  
  
"Which was?"  
  
"Lambert wanted Sydney to give the CIA the Rambaldi binary code via satellite transmission and then tag K-Directorate Agent Espinoza so that our extraction team could retrieve her," Devlin explained.  
  
"Seamus, that is damned dangerous stuff you're talking about. Double- crossing K-Directorate like that could bring about a difficult situation at SD-6. Eventually word would get back to Sloane that K-Directorate thinks we've double-crossed them, and he'll want to know why. It could bring undue suspicion down on Sydney."  
  
"I realize that, Jack. Look, I'm not condoning Lambert's mission as the most sound, but it is a standard op."  
  
"Yes, but this situation Sydney's walking into is certainly not standard," Jack defended. "It took a lot of wrangling on my part to even arrange this meeting, Seamus. Originally, Sloane wanted to send Sydney into K- Directorate headquarters to retrieve the key, which most certainly would have been suicide for her to attempt. And an arrangement like this: a mutual meeting with snipers watching their every move…well, I cannot blame Sydney for not wanting to jeopardize herself -- and the mission -- by fulfilling the order to tag Anna Espinoza for retrieval."  
  
"I know, Jack. I agree. However, the result of that unfortunate conversation was that Sydney refused to work with him. Furthermore, she told Lambert she wanted me to reinstate Agent Vaughn as her handler, or else she wouldn't transmit the code," Devlin finished ruefully.  
  
Jack's eyes narrowed. "But you said Vaughn's a junior officer. How much time has he got in service?"  
  
"About seven years…in fact, he was recruited by the CIA the same month that Sydney was recruited for SD-6."  
  
"And field time?"  
  
"He's had some, and his missions have been successful. And he's got considerable knowledge about SD-6, which is why I assigned him in the first place. But he has virtually no experience as a handler, Jack."  
  
Jack shook his head, and said emphatically. "No. No good. Sydney is headstrong and stubborn. She needs someone who can keep her in line. She has a tendency to run headlong into disaster because her emotions get in the way. Only time can give a handler the experience to know when to push her and when to back off. This kid can't possibly have what it takes to do that."  
  
"Be that as it may, she refuses to work with anyone else. In fact, when Lambert informed her handler must be a senior officer and that Agent Vaughn was a junior officer, she simply told him that we should promote him."  
  
Jack sighed, shaking his head at Sydney's recklessness.  
  
"Anyway, Jack…it doesn't seem that we have any choice here. Vaughn is the only one she will work with, and we need Sydney's involvement if we are going to bring an end to SD-6 and the Alliance. I'm going to have to promote him and give him back her case in order to keep her on board."  
  
"I know." Jack frowned.  
  
"But there's more, Jack."  
  
"What?"  
  
"I didn't realize this until I pulled his file after the Virginia incident…but assigning Agent Vaughn back to Sydney's case could have serious repercussions."  
  
Jack didn't like the look on Devlin's face. "Such as?"  
  
Devlin paused for a long moment before explaining gravely, "Bill Vaughn was his father."  
  
Jack closed his eyes against the still-fresh pain as his face paled. It seemed that even after all this time, he couldn't escape the aftermath of his wife's actions.  
  
When Jack didn't immediately respond, Devlin continued, "Listen, Jack, I know you've been through enough already. If you think this is too much, I'll understand. I'll refuse her request, even if it means having to lose Sydney in the SD-6 cause."  
  
"No," Jack responded immediately, opening his eyes to glare stubbornly at his long-time colleague. "Sydney needs to be doing this work… It gives her a reason to get up in the morning and face the life she's in. If she didn't have that direction…" He trailed off awkwardly before continuing, "Seamus, I can handle it. It's been a long time. It's Sydney I'm concerned about, not me. She needs to work. She needs to feel that she can somehow correct the terrible wrong of Danny's death."  
  
Devlin nodded silently in reply.  
  
"Besides, this Vaughn doesn't know anything regarding his father's assassination, correct?"  
  
Devlin nodded. "It's been top secret for twenty years, Jack. He'd have no clearance, even if we did promote him."  
  
"And I know that Sydney has no knowledge of Laura's affiliation, nor of her agent status. She has fond memories of her mother…" '…much less than of me…' he thought, "and I see no reason to rob her of those…especially at this time. There's no reason to believe she will ever discover the truth."  
  
"Understood, however, if the truth were at some point exposed…well, I don't have to tell you the possible adversarial situation that could be created between handler and agent. There's no telling what kind of reaction Vaughn is likely to have to discovering that his agent's mother killed his father."  
  
"Would it be safe to assume that Mr. Vaughn chose this profession in order to discover the truth behind his father's death?"  
  
"Well, I would certainly consider it among his original reasons, but I'm sure he quickly discovered that being in the CIA didn't give him any more access to those answers than he had before. However, Vaughn has proven himself to be a very resourceful and smart officer in his own right, Jack. And he's got that uncanny knack with hunches that Bill used to have. Would have made Bill downright proud, actually…that is, if Bill didn't kick his ass for joining up in the first place…"  
  
Jack nodded, both in understanding and in memory of an agent that they had both worked with. Remorsefully, he admitted, "I wish there had been some way I could have prevented Sloane from recruiting Sydney… I hate to think of her wrapped up in all of this…"  
  
Delvin answered, "Jack, there was nothing you could have done."  
  
More vehemently, he said, "Yes, there was. I should have stopped him. Sydney should never have been involved in this. If there is anything I hate Sloane for most, that is it. I don't care that she had two spy parents. I don't care if she was a natural. Damn it, she was an innocent! She should have been able to stay an innocent."  
  
"Jack, you know that Sloane suspected you after Bosnia… You know he did this as a test of your loyalty to him and to the Alliance. You knew that then. You knew that, and that was why you allowed Sydney to be recruited. Because if you had stopped her, he would have known you were a mole. If you had stopped her, everything you had been working toward for 15 years would have been a waste. If you had stopped her, most likely she would have been dead anyway, and so would you."  
  
Jack said nothing more; he simply nodded. Deep down, he knew it was true, but he felt so damned guilty that he hadn't done more, done anything, to keep Sydney from following his own fate. Masking his emotions once again, he asked Devlin neutrally, "Is there anything else?"  
  
His eyes connecting with Jack's, Devlin said, "No. That was it."  
  
Nodding, Jack stood up and started to turn to leave. Then, turning back, he said, "But I expect you to keep an eye on this Mr. Vaughn, Seamus. He may be Bill's son, but he's got my daughter's life in his hands. I want to be kept apprised."  
  
Devlin stood, wanting to convey the seriousness of his reply. "Of course, Jack."  
  
"Until next time, then," Jack said, and without further ado, crossed to the door, opened it and exited, closing the door behind him with a silent click.  
  
Devlin stood for a long moment, staring at the closed door and thinking about the man who'd just left: a man who, if they weren't both government agents, he would have called a friend. Then he sat and rearranged himself at his desk, pulling a folder from the top of his inbox and laying it open over Sydney Bristow's closed one. Pushing the intercom button, he said to Ms. Markell, "Martha?"  
  
"Yes, Mr. Devlin?" Martha Markell's voice echoed back through the intercom speaker.  
  
"I need you to locate Junior Agent Vaughn. Tell him I need to see him in my office right away." 


End file.
